


Sansa takes a lover

by Ophelia_Raine



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Affairs, Alternate Universe - Beach, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Feels, Beach Holidays, Beach House, Beach Sex, F/M, Falling In Love, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Infidelity, Lover for hire, Marriage, Older Man/Younger Woman, Romance, Seduction, Sexual Content, Sexual Fantasy, Walks On The Beach, lovers and husbands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-14
Updated: 2018-03-14
Packaged: 2019-03-31 05:36:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13968489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ophelia_Raine/pseuds/Ophelia_Raine
Summary: The power of suggestion is an insidious thing.Sansa Stark found that once the idea of a torrid affair takes seed, it never completely goes away. She would stand in the shower and get very wet just picturing a faceless man tracing his finger over her nipple.Watching her closest friend guiltlessly indulge in paramour after paramour only fuels her own growing sense of dissatisfaction with her mostly empty marital bed.It is almost the end of summer in her thirteenth year of marriage when Sansa asks Margaery how a prominent woman of means goes about discreetly procuring a lover.





	Sansa takes a lover

**Author's Note:**

> Today marks exactly a year since I joined A03. Here's an anniversary gift from me to this ship that I love.

The power of suggestion is an insidious thing. 

Sansa Stark found that once the idea of a torrid affair takes seed, it never completely goes away. She would stand in the shower and get very wet just picturing a faceless man tracing his finger over her nipple.

Watching her closest friend guiltlessly indulge in paramour after paramour only fuels her own growing sense of dissatisfaction with her mostly empty marital bed.

It is almost the end of summer in her thirteenth year of marriage when Sansa asks Margaery how a prominent woman of means goes about discreetly procuring a lover.

* * *

Sansa had married a very important man who remains very important still despite his advancing years. It is true there is no one else like him, but Sansa privately believes he hangs on tightly in order to keep on moving. Standing still for the man feels tantamount to an early death. 

It used to be that he couldn't bear to leave her. That whenever work called him away, it was a visible wrench from her warmth and her bed. But today, he sounds almost bored when he tells her he has to go away on business for ten whole days.

* * *

“I have arranged it all,” Margaery says and her eyes are dancing with mischief and expectation. She claps her hands rapidly like a schoolgirl or a seal. "Ten days, you said? I have the perfect man." 

"What is he like?" Sansa asks, and Margaery shakes her curls.

"All you need to know is that he will be your lover. He is not one of mine — I've never had him. But I know he'll be what you need."

"Is he very experienced?" Sansa asks, and her cheeks redden even though she's hardly a virgin.

"Do you trust me?" Margaery replies.

* * *

Sansa arrives at the beach house three hours away from her home. It is one of Margaery's many escapes but her friend assures her of its seclusion and virginity. "I've never taken a man there. Or a woman." 

He is to come and meet her here, her lover. He's been given the address and told a time two hours from now. Sansa twists her scarf around her neck and swallows her panic. Margaery was certain about her personal safety. "And he doesn't look like a dog."

She's just about to call the whole thing off when the doorbell chimes sweetly.

* * *

Her mouth falls open of its own accord. He is nothing like what she had expected. The cumulating nerves of the last few minutes, hours, days, weeks now grip her like live wires and she quivers as she stands before him, her mind a screaming blank, her tongue incapable of speech. 

He is wearing a loose white linen shirt, tucked out and opened in a deep V at the collar. His pants are soft and pool a little just above his sandals. His smile is winsome, his eyes knowing. His face is shaved and he is nothing like her husband.

* * *

"I'm Petyr," he smiles and it is open and friendly and kind. "I believe you placed an order for a lover." 

"I h... have," Sansa manages to reply. "Do come in." And he saunters past, brushing her arm in the doorway. He smells of sea salt, clean linen, mint, and musk.

When she finds the rest of her voice, her business head finally takes over. They will have ten days until her husband returns home. She will pay full price for services rendered during the course of his stay. Either of them can terminate arrangements effective immediately. No questions asked.  

* * *

He leaves shortly after, surprising her in a day already overflowing with the unusual. But before he leaves, he pauses again at the doorway, bending his head slightly so it almost touches her forehead. 

"I've never done this before," she breathes her confession.

"That much is clear," he replies softly. She turns her head away, self-conscious, and he uses that to brush his lips across her temple.

"I promise to be gentle," he murmurs near her ear. "And kind. You set the pace."

When he presses his lips to hers, she tastes salt and realises its from her own tears.

* * *

He returns the next day to find his client a tetchy wreck and full of contradiction. 

"I cannot do this to my marriage," she gasps, "to my husband!"

"And yet you asked for me."

“I wasn't expecting you to be... _you!_ "

She is twitchy and nervy, a cat on a hot tin roof. He steps forward and hesitates for just a second before he wraps his arms around her from behind. He waits until she softens.

"You can call this off anytime," he reminds her huskily. But then adds, "I just think it will be a wonderful opportunity missed, that's all."

* * *

The house is right on the beach and it is only natural that they should kick off their shoes and walk along the waterline. Their chemistry is palpable and she catches him stealing glances her way, eyes thoughtful. 

The fact that he genuinely finds her attractive — and not just because she's paying him handsomely to bed her — fills her with growing confidence that perhaps she might be able to pull this off after all.

As the waves pound the shore, she tells him how she's always loved the beach and hates the city. That's when he decides to kiss her properly.

* * *

Even though there existed an unspoken understanding from the first that they each park Real Life outside the front door, Sansa finds herself telling Petyr things. 

"My husband is a powerful man. Tenacious, intelligent, and terrifying to those who are smart enough to recognise that he is the one really pulling the strings. I didn't always love him. But I've watched him overcome insurmountable odds, even at his age. That is partly what turned me on. That, and my family were appalled that I could even think to sleep with the enemy."

"Do you still love your husband?"

"Of course."

* * *

"What changed, do you know?" 

And she thinks for a long moment until he isn't sure she actually heard him.

"His ambition keeps getting in the way. There is always something with him. A fire that has to be put out, another corner of the world to conquer. And perhaps I was one too, something to be conquered. Only attractive when I was something to... _do._ "

The sea breeze snatches her words as soon as they leave her mouth. But he hears every syllable when she adds,

"I was interesting to him until the children came. And then I wasn't."

* * *

"Tell me what you like." 

He asks this after the lights are turned down low. After the dinner has been cooked, and the wine has been uncorked and imbibed. The windows are closed and the fireplace is open and warm. They have made a bed from a mountain of cushions and a sea of soft blankets.

Her eyes are dreamy and dark when she tells him haltingly that she likes to be taken by surprise. Bent over after unpacking the dishwasher, maybe. Mauled in the garden on a warm summer's day. She likes to feel adored.

Her hands pinned, dominated.

* * *

When he finally undresses her, peels her clothing off layer by layer by layer... When he finally reaches her centre, finally touches her flesh warm and smooth and supple, the fire in the hearth had sunk so low that her auburn hair vanishes into the reddish-black of the room. 

He feels rather than sees her, on his way down. He feels the concave of her tummy when his tongue flicks over the rosy buds of her small pale breasts. He moves her hand away when she reaches across to hide the loose, soft flesh where her babies once grew underneath.  

* * *

"Tell me what you like." 

And this time, it is difficult to speak even though her mouth is open in ecstasy while his is otherwise engaged. He sups on her like a man used to eternity. The fact that the hairs on his face, his chin do not scrape against her thigh in the effort is something she strangely misses.

"Tell me what you _really_ like." And she squeezes her eyes shut, reddening. But she is paying him, after all.

"Face me down, close my legs so I am tight, hold my hands so I cannot move. Then take me."

* * *

"Stay with me." 

"No. The hallmark of a lover is that he leaves. The husband stays. But at least you get an aubade," he grins. "A sappy morning song when lovers separate at dawn."

She chuckles when he clears his throat. He sings:

_I loved the way she felt around me when she came._  
_I'll miss the way she calls my name._  
_Her hair, copper magic, when it's tousled..._  
_I am ensorceled._

He kisses her deeply, like a man truly in love. She smiles as he strokes her until she falls asleep and he leaves her side right at daybreak.

* * *

He returns late in the evening, and her body is humming for his already. 

"What you did... last night... when I shuddered. That was my first real orgasm in years."

His eyes are soft and they hold no judgement and for that, she wants to weep and take him home.

"Could you promise me something? It's small, but important. With me, right here, so long as I am under your employ... tell me if I do not satisfy you." He smirks. "Call it quality control."

She nods and searches his face for honesty. "Tell me what you like," she entreats.

* * *

"I like to hear your pleasure," he says and strokes her face, touches her lips. "Can you be loud?"

"How loud?" she squeaks and flushes again, and he laughs a deep throaty laugh that wets her sex and whets her appetite.

"I've never tried," she admits. "There were always people. It used to be because we were secret, and then it was because of the servants. And when the children came, we had to be so quiet. I guess... I've never tried to be loud."

He pulls her hands over her head, crosses them at her wrists.

"Moan for me."

* * *

The fruity notes of her hair and how they cover her, heavy and soft. The way she smells like laundry freshly dried in the breeze. The taste of her skin like salt on the beach and sex and desire. 

"Where are the children?" he asks.

"At camp."

"No, Sansa..." and his eyes narrow and darken. "Where are the children now?"

Understanding fires her eyes. "Down the hallway. Asleep in their rooms."

"Can they hear us?"

"Perhaps."

"Moan for me." And he slips into her and starts thrusting gently.

Her gasps graduate to desperate entreaties and his cries mingle with hers.

* * *

This time he's there when she wakes at dawn but she says nothing. Her smile says everything.

They take a walk on the beach and their fingers intertwine like they did in bed last night. True to his word, he takes her suddenly. She is down on the sand and when his tongue ruts her sex in full view of the gulls and sea, she is slicker than she's ever been before.

Her cries, sighs and groans are swallowed by the rhythmic cacophony of waves. But only just. A man walks his dog in the distance and politely turns away.

* * *

The days start to run together, although the nights remain distinct. As time trickles like virgin sand from her palms, Sansa's darker thoughts start to fret at the banks of her newfound happiness. 

She is thoroughly in love with this man and not with the one she has to return to.

"I don't want to leave!" she admits to him tonight. Her back is still slick from their recent exertions, but the air feels frigid as she contemplates her days, her life ahead.

"Sweetling, I cannot stay. There are children." His stare penetrates. "I have a wife. There are realities."

* * *

"I don't want to let you go." 

He sighs heavily. "I am only an illusion. It's easier to love a lover for a time than a husband for all your days. Just as it's harder to be interesting constantly than to produce the occasional _bon mot._ "

She caresses his face and starts to weep in earnest. "This is the most honest I have ever been. I'm terrified I'll never have it again."

He wipes her tears and tells her a truth. "All a lover does is to teach a wife all that her husband has kept from her, sweetling."

* * *

In the last thirty-six hours, they had rutted in every possible room and in every possible way. But now she lies in his arms, still naked underneath the patchwork blanket. He pushes the swing with the big toe of his left foot as she dozes on his shoulder. The wood creaks as it rubs against the frame and he stares off into the unrelenting sea.

He loves her with all he has to give. But tomorrow, this all ends. It breaks his heart that she makes love to him as if it were her very last shot at true love. 

* * *

Sansa stares at her clock and watches a full minute pass. The children return tomorrow. Her husband returns today. 

She'll have to come clean with him. There is no other way. This isn't something she can pretend never happened, it's impossible. The guilt alone will kill her. And then, of course, there's the payment owing.

The car pulls into their driveway. She hears the garage door rise and fall. The key turns in the lock and her husband is home.

She stands up uncertainly. His gaze is piercing. His chin is still unshaven, her hickeys still prominent on his neck.

* * *

The silence between husband and wife is thick and heavy, but it breaks when Sansa's lip quivers as it has all week.

"Petyr!" she barely whispers. "I'm so sorry I tried to cheat on you!"

And she crumples to the floor but he is there in an instant. His suit is pressed and bespoke, his shoes shined and expensive. Gone is the man in the soft white linen shirt and carefree sandals. Holding her instead is the feared political operator, father of her children, and husband of thirteen mostly lonely years.

"You didn't cheat on me." His smile is crooked.

* * *

"But I did!" she sobs. "In my heart, and my every intention." 

"Then I'm sorry I'd driven you into the arms of another," he replies hoarsely. "Even if that other turned out to still be me. You haven't paid my fee, by the way."

She wants to laugh, but she cries even harder instead. And he holds her and rocks her and loves her.

"Why did you shave?" she asks eventually.

"You wanted a different man. And I wanted to be that man for you." He kisses her softly. "I want to be every man for you. Husband and lover."

* * *

Someone once said there wasn't a greater difference between any two men than there often is, within the same man, a lover and a husband.

Within Petyr, he learns, lives a once careless husband and the lover besotted enough to sing an aubade off-key.

Who was the greater cheater in the end? She'd taken a lover for ten days, but his lifelong mistress had been his ambition. Still, they both forgive each other every time he sinks himself into her flesh and their separateness is no more.

His beard grows back eventually, and they return to the seaside every year.

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks goes to apocketfulofwry who, apart from yelling "Sabbatical!" every twenty minutes, is also my favourite fanfic muse.
> 
> As for some of Petyr's thoughts on lovers and husbands... I channelled the wisdom of Honore de Balzac and Samuel Richardson.


End file.
